Saturday, April 23, 2011

Albert Hotel

Last Sunday's Streetscapes column (the only column in the New York Times I cannot do without- would everyone wrote as well as Christopher Gray) was about the Albert Hotel. I have walked past it (University and Eleventh Street) many times. Usually I think "oh, that's where Thomas Wolfe used to live." I remember that one of his other Village residences was near St. Vincent's, because he'd amuse himself by trying to peer in the windows of the nurses' residence. But Gray always knows more stuff about a building than I do. Albert Pinkham Ryder (the painter of Death on a Pale Horse) had a brother, William, who managed the Albert for a few years. The architect was Henry Hardenbergh (I grew up with descendants of his), whose great work was the Plaza Hotel. But the coolest thing I learned was that "during a nasty winter" at the Albert, John and Michelle Phillips wrote California Dreamin'.